Introduction

This chapter considers the production and sale of household goods during the Second Industrial Revolution; how their production was organised and how manufacturers responded to consumer tastes in an entrepreneurial manner in order to profit, and to add to the economic growth of Great Britain. It was a project started by Francesca, who was inspired to examine the production of goods for the home due to their general neglect by scholars in favour of the history of staple and capital goods. In terms of industrial production, our understanding of the dynamics of economic growth during the period of the Second Industrial Revolution is largely confined to the contribution of staple goods such as textiles and food, or capital goods such as ships, iron and steel and coal, although work has been done on pottery. There was, Francesca felt, an element of bias against goods that were considered to be of prime importance to the home and therefore perceived to be of prime importance to women. Both of us shared a suspicion that more importance was placed upon the ‘large’, ‘important’ and ‘weightier’ (i.e. less frivolous) products made of iron and steel – engines, machinery and rails – that had traditionally been seen as part of the male preserve. Francesca wished to redress this imbalance by outlining the importance of household goods to the manufacturing sector as a whole. She also wished to highlight the importance of the interaction between the consumer and the producer in shaping changes in the manufacture of such goods. She further sought to build upon her previous work on industrial districts, given that the making of household goods often took place in specific towns and cities, carried out by skilled and specialised labour.

That is not to say that consumer goods have been ignored. They have been considered for their artistic merit and for their functional purpose. The history of retailing is well documented, taking into account the sale of household goods. The world of nineteenth-century consumption has been amply illustrated by a rich literature on the cultural relationship between consumers and the objects they purchased, or aspired to own. This literature has provided us with extensive information about the goods purchased by the Victorians and Edwardians, but entirely from the consumers’ point of view.